Fun Word Origins Quiz: How Well Do You Know the History of the English Language?

Test your knowledge of English etymology. Can you pick the correct origin story for each of these words? This quiz will take you through the ages and around the English-speaking world. The meaning of the words may not be challenging, but some of these histories are downright bizarre!

Word Origins

You may understand the meaning of all the words in the Oxford English Dictionary, but do you know the stories of how they entered modern English? Take this etymology quiz on words with weird or interesting origin stories and see how many you can figure out. No hitting the books to look them up! How much do you really know about the history of the English language?

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Question 1/10

What is the origin of the word "clue"?

The French word for "association"
A Greek word for a ball of yarn, such as the one used to navigate the minotaur's maze
The name of the American nineteenth-century mystery writer, Gerald Clu
A popular confidence game, run by pirates in the Mediterranean

Question 2/10

Where does the word "jumbo" come from?

The name of a circus elephant
An old Sioux word for "chief"
James Beaux, the architect of a large United States monument
A children's book protagonist of unusual girth

Question 3/10

You may know how to make a good sandwich, but who would you credit for the name of this popular lunchtime option?

A late eighteen-century Irish tea shop known for serving a more substantial meal than most of its contemporaries
A reporter for the early tabloid industry
An earl who asked for his meat to be placed between slices of bread because he didn't like to get his hands dirty while playing cards
A United States senator who would grab a quick meal on the run in order not to waste time

Question 4/10

Like so many words in the Oxford English Dictionary, "genuine" comes from a Latin word that means almost the same thing. But what's the origin of the Latin word?

A common epitaph found on funerary urns
Military traditions involving the oaths veteran commanders would swear to their new recruits
The scale with which Roman moneylenders would weigh silver
The Latin word for "knee" and Roman birth custom

Question 5/10

Who was the original "dunce"?

Daniel Ulysses Nolan Cleary, a milliner who tried to bring tall, conical hats back into style
Duns Scotus, a Scottish theologian whose work fell out of favor during the English Reformation and Renaissance
Duncan Smith, the village idiot in seventeenth-century English ballads
Dunce Waller, a folklore character in medieval poems and plays

Question 6/10

The word "sycophant" has a couple of different stories attached to it, but its root words are uncontested. The roots of "sycophant" mean...

Crown-related
Fig-shower
Pet-fashioned
Boot-licker

Question 7/10

The word "ketchup" first came into use as a transliteration of a word from which of these languages?

Chinese
Modern Gaelic
Italian
Russian

Question 8/10

When you purchase a mortgage, you're probably not thinking about the French origins of the word, which means...

Moral measure
Money gauntlet
Glove custom
Death pledge

Question 9/10

If you know something about drama, it's no surprise that "tragedy" comes from the Greek tragoedia. But do you know what its Greek roots mean?

Sad play
Drama competition
Goat song
Festival dance

Question 10/10

Are you tired? Did this quiz leave you groggy? Almost done. Just one more. Where does the word "groggy" come from?

An admiral who demanded that his sailors dilute their rum, a weaker drink that came to be called after "Old Grog," the admiral's nickname
A potent cocktail that sailors encountered in the West Indies and was commonly served as a nightcap
An early medical term for alcohol-related dementia
A magician named Maestro Gregory who was skilled in the art of misdirection

Calculating Result...

Fun Word Origins Quiz: How Well Do You Know the History of the English Language?